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Hello everyone, I went to the Spiceworks Unplugged event last week - it was great, so I decided to join the community.

I'm a vendor but I thought I'd post a technical question that may also help other vendors.

We'll be attending a trade show at the end of this month and we'd like to demonstrate our new product, however it will look cooler if we use tablets. The problem is, every year so far we have been unable to use wireless at the event due to so many other wireless access points at the show. Our AP just did not work.

Question is: What would be a good solution to getting wireless to work at a trade show with so many other AP's nearby?

Another option to try and help your situation is to change the antennae on your Wifi AP. Using 5.4 GHZ will be cool (as long as the tablets/laptops can see a 5.4 GHZ signal, not all can, but most newer do). A higher gain antenna will certainly drown out the other signals, but they may be mad at you lol. You could play with power output and such so that your high gain signal is limited to a certain radius, depending on location. You can check this article out to give ya some more direction and idea. Channel and frequency isn't the only considerations for WiFi. :)

what did you use for and AP? was it consumer hardware like a Linksys or was it enterprise grade hardware? I would make sure to use an enterprise grade devices in an environment like that. (I would get a dual band AP so you have the most choice. 5.8GHZ and 2.5GHZ)

and take a spectrum analyzer in with you that way you can view what channels your neighbors are using and pick on accordingly. Most of the AP's in an uncontrolled environment like that are probably all on the same channel

If you are going to stand right next to the AP, I would try lowering the signal strength, Seams counter intuitive but you only need the signal to transmit a few feet and not 100 feet. this will actually help reduce signal noise. If you could convince everyone else to do the same (good luck) the problem would just go away.

Yeah, realistically your only option here is to shout the loudest & drown out the rest. You may want to invest in a new AP, the more powerful the better. You could also look at external antennas to boost the signal as much as possible.

I have been very impressed with the Ubiquiti UniFi access points. In your case I would look at the Long Range one or the Pro one:http://www.ubnt.com/unifi#aplr

Last but not least, Aerohive have a great range of AP's to suit pretty much any need. I am friends with one of their engineers, some of the stories he has of where they used their AP's is amazing. http://www.aerohive.com/products/access-points

Guys, 'More powerful' will not do the trick. Higher gain antennas, while boosting the signal, also boost the noise that they pick up, defeating your whole scheme. Moreover, it will not increase throughput one iota. Using a different antenna with a different pattern is a reasonable suggestion, as is using the 5 GHz spectrum if available (there are 10 non-overlapping 5 GHz channels available, as opposed to 3-4 in the 2.4 GHz spectrum). If you are looking for decent throughput in a noisy spectrum, you probably will not get it. Co-channel interference kills you. Your only real hop is to find uncluttered spectrum in the 5 GHz band to use.

Since you mentioned Ch 13, I hope this show was outside the US - The FCC gets pretty upset with folks broadcasting on non-approved frequencies.

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